Blogs For McCain

Yesterday, Kavon linked to the most recent Iowa poll conducted by Research 2000 and KCCI. It has many surprising elements to it, particularly on the Democratic side. Obama is tied for first with Edwards at 22% and Hillary is down at a mere 10%. On the Republican side though, the numbers correspond to most of the recent national polls we’ve seen in the past few months. McCain and Giuliani are dueling it out for 1st in the high 20’s and Romney continues to hover around 10% or so. The fact that Romney has a better organization than McCain in the state and particularly lived there during the 2006 campaign, I don’t understand how Romney’s numbers are barely moving at all. At the same time, given that McCain not only skipped the Iowa caucuses in 2000 but he also isn’t shy about his opposition to ethanol subsidies, the fact that he is leading the pack is quite surprising. McCain and Romney have the best organizations in Iowa and we all know that in the caucuses a strong organization helps you win. Which brings me to Rudy Giuliani.

Even with all of his recent staff moves, I have remained somewhat doubtful that he was really going to mount a serious run for the Presidency. According to Republius, Rudy plans to give the keynote speech at New Hampshire State Republican Committee next month and he has secured the services of ace RNC operative Mike DuHaime. DuHaime ran much of Bush’s 04 Northeast operation and I highly doubt he would’ve signed with Rudy if he wasn’t going to seriously run. Rudy will be up in New Hampshire and will undoubtedly try to get more endorsements and staff. This led me to think that while Rudy might be running, he has no organization in Iowa at all. Iowa and South Carolina are the most conservative primaries in the country and perhaps Rudy doesn’t think he has a chance to win the state. If he focuses his strength on New Hampshire, he could have a good shot. NH is traditionally the prime ground of insurgent candidates. This would more or less be the McCain 2000 strategy and we all know how well that worked out.

There are several problems here, though. Rudy is polling better in Iowa than he is in New Hampshire. Rudy has near universal name recognition but NH is McCain country. He’s been a good 10-15 points ahead of his closest competition (Rudy) for going on 2 years now. Also, since NH is right next to Massachusetts, almost everyone there knows who Romney is too. It’s certainly possible (even probable) that Rudy will begin to put together an organization in Iowa early next year, but the longer he waits the more people that McCain and Romney will snatch up. I heard from a friend that is connected to the Iowa GOP that a lot of people would be interested in joining a Giuliani campaign but he’s done no outreach in the state and most people are signing with McCain, Romney, Brownback, even Gilmore. The Caucus Cooler blog even speculated that Rudy had talked to McCain and Romney about “joining forces” whatever that means. [UPDATE: CC meant that Steve Scheffler, head of the Iowa Christian Alliance was talking about joining with McCain or Romney and not Rudy. Sorry about that.] One thing’s for sure, Rudy is running a very unorthodox campaign with huge risks.